UK’s ASA bans ads by Oatly over ‘misleading’ green claims

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) launched an investigation into the campaign after receiving complaints from members of the public and the campaign group A Greener World

The UK advertising watchdog has banned a high-profile marketing campaign by Swedish alt-milk brand Oatly after ruling its green claims were misleading.

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) launched an investigation into the campaign after receiving 109 complaints from members of the public and the campaign group A Greener World.

In one national newspaper ad the company, which attracted investment from Blackstone, Oprah Winfrey and Jay-Z last year ahead of floating on the US stock market in May, claimed ‘climate experts say cutting dairy and meat products from our diets is the single biggest lifestyle change we can make to reduce our environmental impact’.

The ASA said consumers would understand the claim to be a ‘definitive, objective claim that was based on scientific consensus,’ when instead it was the opinion of one climate expert.

Oatly maintained that following a vegan diet would reduce a person’s environmental impact more than cutting down their flights, buying an electric car, or purchasing sustainable meat and dairy.

In paid-for ads on Twitter and Facebook, Oatly claimed the ‘dairy and meat industries emit more CO2 than all the world’s planes, trains, cars, boats etc, combined’.

However, when the ASA investigated the claim it found Oatley had ‘overstated’ the emissions of the meat and dairy industry because the company did not take into account emissions covering the full life cycle of transport, only emissions when a vehicle is driven.

Oatly said it had no plans to repeat the claim and removed posts making similar claims from its own social media channels.

The ASA said it expected to see the blanket claim based on evidence comparing all Oatly products and types of cow’s milk. However, it was based on a single product.

Oatly spokesman, Tim Knight, said: It’s clear that we could have been more specific in the way we described some of the scientific data.